Canine Tactical Combat Casualty Care (K9TCCC) Guidelines

Thomas H Edwards, Lee E Palmer, Rebecca L Baxter, Thomas C Sager, James G Coisman, Jamie C Brown, Clinton George, Andrew C McGraw

J Spec Oper Med Spring 2020;20(1):101-111.

First introduced in 1996, Tactical Combat Casualty Care (TCCC) redefined prehospital, point-of- injury (POI), battlefield trauma care for the human combat casualty. Today, many consider TCCC as one of the most influential interventions for reducing combat-related case fatality rates from preventable deaths in human combat casualties. Throughout history, Military Working Dogs (MWDs) have proved and continue to prove themselves as force multipliers in the success of many military operations. Since the start of the Global War on Terror in 2001, these elite canine operators have experienced an upsurge in combat-related deployments, placing them at a higher risk for combat-related injuries. Until recently, consensus- based Canine-TCCC (K9TCCC) guidelines for POI battlefield trauma care did not exist for the MWD, leaving a critical knowledge gap significantly jeopardizing MWD survival. In 2019, the Canine Combat Casualty Care Committee was formed as an affiliate of the Committee on Tactical Combat Casualty Care with the intent of developing evidence- based, best practice K9TCCC guidelines. Modeled after the same principles of the human TCCC, K9TCCC focuses on simple, evidence-based, field- proven medical interventions to eliminate preventable deaths and to improve MWD survival.

Customized for the battlefield, K9TCCC uniquely adapts the techniques of TCCC to compensate for canine-specific anatomic and physiological differences.